


pais patrias

by Anonymous



Category: Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Gen, Magical Enjolras, Magical Realism, Other, Psychic Vampirism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 14:31:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6989065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life is flow, give and take, and so is love. The land has loved him all his life, and he has to follow its call. — Or less poetic: Enjolras is a republican fanatic feelsvampire fairy in a committed open relationship with Patria and the revolution.</p>
            </blockquote>





	pais patrias

**Author's Note:**

> So-far partial fill for a prompt at the makinghugospin Les Misérables kinkmeme.

_Kissing Agathon, I had my soul upon my lips; for it rose, poor wretch, as though to cross over.  
—"Lovers' Lips", attributed to Plato, author unknown_

* * *

It is a regular night at the Musain, the Friends of the ABC come together in the back room that is theirs alone. One table breaks out in raucous laughter as the other one holds neat bound stacks of paper, incendiary rhetoric captured in print to be spread in the streets of Paris come tomorrow. Next to them are some of their brightest heads bent together, Courfeyrac relaying the news passed on from their brothers in the other societies.

Grantaire sits among his friends and gives the occasional laugh or comment. But he is content to sit and watch them too, and one of them in particular. Enjolras, his first lieutenant at his side, is furiously scribbling away at something now that their messenger has left them to join the others. He is as beautiful in his intensity as he ever is, focused on the work which is his calling, and observing him is forever his greatest pleasure in life. It is also how he developed the skill to read him better than most of their friends. It is not obvious to them, distracted as they are, but he can already see the little tells before they become apparent to others.

The way he holds himself, how his fingers grip the quill, the creeping pallor that so often threatens him but is usually not allowed to progress if they can help it. Combeferre is looking at him across the room with meaning, for he has noticed too, and while Enjolras is immersed in his writing and unthinkingly waving off his furtive touches and attempts at concern, the former has taken matters into his own hand and detected and chosen an opportune moment. Grantaire rises to it and loudly declaims into the room while the others quip back at him, until Enjolras gives in and puts an exasperated hand on his high brow. When their noble leader rises and steps out back it is only expected and above suspicion. His lieutenant has drawn Feuilly into conversation, who had been the only one sitting with them.

Nobody gives particular notice when Grantaire finally stands a moment later with apparent heroic effort to aquire a new bottle, since predictably no one would sacrifice their own and Louison will not come by for some time, forcing him to leave the room; even if he does so in the wrong direction. Only Combeferre throws him the tiniest of glances; he knows of him and he knows of them and he does not judge. He could have gone himself, too, but Grantaire is glad for being gifted the moment by the other man.

He finds Enjolras on the twisted stairs beyond, back and palms pressed to the wall, his face drawn and deep eyes turned inward now that he is no longer distracted from himself. Grantaire takes his hand and leans against him, brushing by his cheek to kiss by his ear.

"I am here."

Enjolras presses his hand in answer. His right hand comes up to grasp his open cravat and hold him close as he turns and leans into him, the touch of his open mouth to his neck, breathing deeply, and Grantaire can feel the first starts of the familiar trickle passing over. The hand releases him and moves up into his hair, and the lips, searching, follow across his jawline to his mouth. Then Enjolras lips are over his, a kiss bestowed, and his heart beats in his throat and there is a _pull_ and his heart and soul gladly follow the call and spill over to the one beloved by him, and Enjolras drinks him down like it is the elixir of life.

Grantaire can feel the answering flow pushing back at him, sparking through him, and to get closer he pins him to the wall, reaches out one arm to cradle him. His hand sneaks past a waistcoat to lay over ribs and muscle, warm through the shirt, and though he sometimes would rather like to get even closer, to go further in this particular direction, this is not the time or place— or _his_ place.

Enjolras too stops after a few minutes and the flow abates as he leans their foreheads together and just breathes into the space between their mouths, lips tingling. Grantaire knows the man in his arms will tear himself away soon to return to his work. He presses their joined hands, and offers a hopeful "Come over to-night when you are finished here. If you need to?" His lodgings are out into the Rue des Grès and not five minutes away.

Enjolras nods into his shoulder and kisses his cheek before he disentangles himself and returns to his comrades, once more fresh-faced and rosy.

Grantaire will be there for him when he returns, when he is in need, tonight and every other.

* * *

When he is young Enjolras' mother tells him how she had suspected early on that he would be like her, was sure of it in the way he had felt in her belly. Then he had been born and she had put him to her breast, and as he suckled she had known for sure, felt herself flowing out to him though his lips and wherever they touched as he _drank_. Afterwards she kisses him and steals a bit of him right back to make her heart grow. Love is life is flow, that is how it has always been for her, and the land is _home_ , and she will show him all of this as he grows. When he is weaned he still comes into her embrace and basks in her love, put his lips on her neck and face and hands; he drinks of her, and goes out to her when he feels her answering pull.

When he is old enough to understand she tells him that other people are different, that they do not feel or need the ebb and flow of life as both of them do. There have been others like them in her family line as far back as is remembered; maman knows no name for what they are, except _kin_. People who are not kin do not understand or know, and he cannot tell them; when he is older and finds a trustworthy soul he may tell. But he should always err on the side of caution, maman says, because people might think them bad and broken or want to catch them. Papa knows and does not mind; he kisses maman on the mouth and she drinks him in. Maman does not mind sharing papa's love with him either, because love never becomes smaller by sharing.

He grows up at his family's home in the country and the grounds and woods around it. His life is charmed, even more so than his mother expected. He is loved, by people and animals and _things_. The fiercest dogs before him become tame as a puppy or cower in fear and dare not harm a hair on his golden head, long locks gleaming in the Sun, because maman can't bear to cut it. He never seems to put his weight on a breaking branch when he climbs or slip from the rickety handrail across the stream; the day after he passes it without so much as a glance, his father finds half of it collapsed into the waters. From his wife he is used to a certain amount of strangeness, but his son makes to exceed her in every regard, and he can merely shake his head. If Enjolras somehow does manage to injure himself, he is fine without ailments in the shortest of time, and his skin is unmarred and soft as if it was afresh.

Enjolras loves his home and the land and all the things in it. He loves the Sun and the flowered meadows and the softness of the bunnies behind the stables, the flight of the birds and their insect chorus, the old woods, the smell of rain in the air and in the ground and the big ash tree that calls to him.

He often sits in their church and looks at the pretty colors the windows paint on the walls and floor. If he waits, he can feel himself fill up the small space and the stone around him comes alive with the memory of generations of people who came here in sadness and joy and faith, their echoes layered in the walls and tempered by time like a fine wine from his father's cellars.

He looks and touches and soaks everything in and is alive.

To him, the land is _mother_. His father tells him the land is "France. Our patria. That means the land of your fathers." When he asks why it is not his mother's land, because after all it is maman that knows it more, his father just laughs and pats his curls. "If you want it to it can be your mother's land also." He does, because he likes that name.

His life is paradise and freedom, and he knows nothing else.

* * *

He is six the first time he visits a city, accompanying his father on business. Everything is so _much_ here, so much houses and people and things, he thinks as he watches from the carriage window. He still has to wait but he behaves himself well and plays with the other children in the gardens; though he makes an effort to be like them he still has to sneak off alone twice to the other side of the grounds and bury his face in the catkins, telling the willow there how beautiful he is. It gives him relief from the pressure that has been building up in him ever since they arrived, but which he can't yet identify.

Later his father takes him out to see the city as promised. The sight of the crowds and disorder is a bit intimidating, the press of them a sudden presence, but he is excited and holds fast to his father's hand. He has to be careful not to get lost, as people bump into him and carriages race past; it is loud and noisy and chaotic and he puts his free hand over his ear as the many voices make his head hurt. His father takes him into the church and it's the biggest he has ever seen, and in she sudden shock of silence and space his eyes and soul take flight to flit through the colums and vaults and the dust dancing in the colored shafts of light. It is cool in here and he can smell the stone and its age teases at the corners of his mind, whispers of what has been, and he needs to touch— His father wants to leave, and though he tells him he's not done yet, papa pulls him away by his hand. Enjolras knows his father doesn't understand what he means because he can't _see_ , and he searches in vain for the words to explain. By then they are out on the steps and the Sun glares in his eyes, and he still feels like he's behind.

Then someone brushes by him and a hand hits the side of his face and he feels her. She's sad, and there's an illness in her, choking her life out, he knows, and from the way he is still outward and stretched something snaps and floods out, and in, and he _feels_ and _knows_ , the crowd, not just a crowd, people, so many people— outwards and outwards, and so many of them are sad, and despairing and hungry, and he sees so many things, feelings and sights and terrible deeds, things for which he has no name and recoils from in fear and—

Misery rise up and chokes him, swallows him whole.

He is crumpled in his papa's embrace in the carriage, though he doesn't remember how they came to be here on the way back. There is a pulse by his face and he weakly draws on that—

"I don't understand," he mumbles into his papa's throat, its skin warm while he himself is steeped in badness, a cold vile and creeping. "Why are they all so sad?" But the thought drips away and so does he, leaking, spilling, bleeding out and he wants to stay whole, be whole, but he can't hold himself in.

Then his maman is holding him and weeping, kissing him, saying she's _sorry, so sorry, I didn't know_ , and some part of him wants to reach back into her but he's too weak, there's not enough of him left—

It's dark outside, as he's carried across the grounds past the old ash tree into the wood and then he's abruptly dropped, a coldness enveloping from without but not reaching him any more. There is an incredulous shout from his papa, dulled, and a pull which tries to drag him back up, but maman says _no let me_ and he's pushed down down, and it's cold and wet—

He's underwater but he can't breathe anyway, floating, away, and everything around is gone, and he's been gone since- since— he can't remember because it is draining away too, the badness going and gone and now he is nothing at all.

Somewhere, there is a spark, then another and another, until there is light inside him and _feeling_ and _things_ reaching back at, flowing into him. There are hands pushing him down, his maman's hands, fingers digging into his skin- _painfully_ \- and he soaks them in and puts his own reawakening fingers into the ground, no longer numb. There are pebbles smooth in his palm and grains of sand against his fingers, and he _grips and pulls_ , and there's water, and his parents, and trees and living things all around, and nothing is choking him anymore—

He breathes in deeply but his mouth fills with water, he coughs and struggles, trying to breathe, trying to— He is heaved up and stands, retching, but _he can breathe and feel and is alive_ again.

He stands and breathes, nose burning, eyes stinging, shivering from the wetness on his skin, cool from the wind rustling in the leaves, skin feeling and holding him in once more. As his parents clutch at him he basks in them and the land that knows him, the sky above full of stars like the map of life inside him, a rock from the riverbed clutched still in his hand.

* * *

The rock he keeps; his parents have it fixed on a chain, and he keeps it in his pocket like he's a big boy with a watch. When he touches it, he fancies he can still feel the echo of the stream and the wood in it; whenever things get bad, it is his calm and anchor. His parents are more careful now when taking him away from home, his mother frightened by his reaction that was alien even to her; but he manages now, can keep himself together even when in unfamiliar places. If he does it well he can keep the badness out and does not lose so much from inside, and he can fill himself up fresh again when he is home.

Here are most of his beloved things. His favourite for some time has been the old ash tree across the field, which he likes to be around and climb and sit in its shade while he reads, listening to the rustling of its leaves as like it were talking to him. Sometimes he stays moulded to it with eyes closed and toes digging into the ground, feels the sun on his skin and wind in his hair and the thrum of life under the bark, and imagines what it is like to be a tree.

The afternoon after he learns about the dryads of old Greece in his reading he sneaks out to his ash and embraces it, feels it pulse in his blood. Its bark is warmed from the sun and, differently, from within. _Meliai I am_ , he giggles at it, and though he knows it to not be true in the strictest sense, he feels it to be true in the way his heart expands. He is sure that the tree loves him too, as much as it is able to do so. He puts his lips to the bark and drinks it in.

* * *

Years later he ventures out early the morning after a severe thunderstorm, because he hasn't slept well and he _needs_ , feeling weird and itchy in his skin, his anxiety mounting with every step, until he sees the burned out husk of his ash tree. When he puts his hands on it it is dead to him and his insides wail and stop.

When they take him back to the house he is smeared with ash and char.

His lessons are cancelled that day. Papa comes to his room and talks to him, pushing the stone into his hands and wrapping the chain around his unresisting fingers. But he can't hear, can't think, until papa leaves again, and he wants to cry ' _stay, stay_ ', but his father is gone. _Because he can't feel and can't ever understand_ , a thought seeps though his mind, vaguely bitter, _no one else can_.

Maman comes to sit with him and strokes his hair. Her dress is dappled with sun and he grips her skirts as he tells her that he never wants to love again, not single things, and not ever bind his _life and soul_ to them, because they can be taken away and it _hurts_ — Only her, only her, and then only Patria Whole.

"Child," she tells him, "do not say such things. What you speak of would be a love as dead; is a garden still a garden if you cut all its flowers and trees? The whole exists through all the life it contains; the land is our mother, but would you disregard all your siblings through which it is alive? Man could not live that way and keep his soul alive, and we especially cannot either, you even less so than me. It would be our death," she murmurs as she strokes his hair. "The land and woods here in your home may sustain you as long as you dwell here, but it is human to love some things apart from others and thus all the more. To do otherwise would be inhuman and render it meaningless, flat and without colour."

"But I have to. And I will be Hers alone," he mumbles.

"You speak as if the land were a jealous mistress. If you cut out all her children from your heart, how could you love each other and survive? She knows what all her children need; do you think she would begrudge the ash tree its love of the water and sun and the ground it stood on? She would not begrudge you your loves either. Grieve them when lost, but never be afraid to love anew or too many or too deeply. Your soul is too big and would be empty otherwise. The land and I cannot be enough for you," she kisses into his hair.

He grieves and feels grey and drained, _draining_ —

The next morning he forces himself to rise, stale coldness still radiating from the vacated space inside him, his face pale. He comes down to find a crate beside the steps and his father waiting for him, but then there is a sound and he is riveted and bends to put his hand on the little ball of fluff and pink skin inside and it yips at him and there is a new warmth flooding up his arm and it says _love, love, life_. There are tiny paws on his breast and a nose in his face and his father is looking down at him with a smile, eyes heavy with feeling, that tells him that _no, maybe he can understand_ , and both warm his ailing heart.

Her small heart is twice as big as herself and she loves him with the kind of wild abandon and devotion peculiar to dogs. He is not immune to her charms and comes to love her back fiercely as she fills the empty stagnating space left by his loss. He names her _Melia_ in honor of the dead.

* * *

As he gets older he learns more about the world outside, its history and politics and how so many of Mankind are cruel and terrible, how they drag down and spoil everything that is sacred, and beat down bloody every bid for freedom made by men better than themselves. He thinks of the day he left that church in the dusty glare of the sun into his first awareness of misery, when he was still too young to understand, and was brought back to life anew in starlight and stream. All his life he had looked out into the world and the land had looked back at him with love, but right then it had shouted, wailed, and thrust her lost children at his soul. And he had heard the call, even if he had been to young to yet do anything with it. _save them_. _save us_. The land and her people were suffering, and he had been called, called like Jeanne had been long ago to save the land and help purge her of those that would do them harm.

So he reads. He reads and learns all he can about the State, so different from what he has known intimately all his life as _Patria_ , and what yet should be the same. The rise and fall of kings and republic and emperor, the horrors of monarchies and the terror of the revolution led astray, turning away from its inital calling of _freedom, equality, brotherhood— love_. All the people are his siblings and they all are of the land and the land is theirs, Patria is _res publica_ , and her true children bear no titles but the proud name of _citizen_.

Usurpers have taken their mother's beautiful house and thrown their brothers and sisters out into the cold, locking the door so no one may follow them in, working them to death while they are growing fat on the spoils. Claiming a right divine to lift one man or a few above their fellow men, as slavemasters over will and life, is falsehood and abomination.

He reads about laws and rights of men and the people. _Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains._ He had been cradled in paradise, must have been, to be grown unbent and free to step out and help his chained siblings throw off their shackles. To still have strength left when he stepped out into the world, not having yet been numbed and spent by years of struggle. He is everything but numb, his mind full of fervour, his heart of love and sorrow, and his belly with rage hot and cold. This is his calling, this is his fight, his work, and the fury he feels at times does not merely seem his own.

* * *

Once, while his father hosts another important man, he snaps. When the man enters the house, he is instantly repelled to a degree he barely can explain to himself, but it only worsens and becomes more apparent as his stay drags on, and every little bit he hears, vapid pleasantries and horrid jokes and cruel politics, every little rich opinion leaving his mouth reveal him to be everything he hates. But he has to play nice so he sits silent and smiles and gives pleasant replies when spoken to and even the stone in his pocket doesn't manage to calm him.

When the horrid man has left he flees to his room to hide away, gripping the solid wood of his desk to anchor himself against the _things_ boiling up inside him, unable and failing to find calm. He stares into the fire which grows brighter and brighter while the room darkens, shadows creeping along the walls, and from far off he hears a pitched terrified whine cut off by a deafening crack. The fire in his heart and in his hearth recedes.

Melia is crouched before him making little whimpering noises.

Feeling returns to him gradually; his hand is painfully cramped and when he manages to turn his head and look over, the massive solid wood under his slight fingers is broken and splintering, and the frame around it warped and scorched.

His mother stands in the open door, struck still, a hand covering her mouth. Enjolras thinks he sometimes frightens himself too these days.

In him there is a savage fury and righteous violence and something older with sharp claws reaching to rip and bleed— He is as Alekto and Megaira and Tisiphone— Because there are those who have sinned against their fellow siblings, who believe themselves secure behind titles and money and soldiers, who will not be swayed by love or mercy or reason but only by having it taken from their hands by force.

He learns to shoot, and to shoot well, and has his father give him teachers who make him learn to fight with sword and blade and cane, and with just his body as a weapon.

* * *

When he is old enough he goes north to Paris to study. His mother especially is loath to see him go alone so far from home, but she accepts his convictions even if she does not fully understand their strength. Paris is a sprawling metropolis beyond his experience but he has long since mastered to keep himself contained in his body, his fortess of skin and bone, and only rarely goes anything wholly past his defenses in either direction. Were it any other, he would have choked on it and drained out into its maws within his first day of stepping off the carriage.

Melia is his constant companion wherever she is allowed to go; when she is not, she patiently waits outside buildings or across town for him to return to her, and so he still can feel her little light during his lectures, her devotion always running though him and keeping his heart alive and warm. At night, he cradles her against him under the covers, fingers carding through her fur, and revels in her warmth and life, reviving him and pushing out the stale vileness that has seeped into him during the day.

Over time, he finds other places and beings to ground himself even in this city. There are gardens where the plants are alive to him and places where the light of the sun shines clean, and old things rooted deep, both still living and never so. He likes to go to church sometimes, when they are mostly empty and the press of people is not immediate anymore; he lets the silence calm him and puts his hand on old stone and wood, lets the layers of time and people that came before sink into him.

He is a weed blown on a strange wind from wood and field into this city of stone, clinging to some crack in the masonry, forlorn, trying to reach for a ray of sunlight and a drop of rain. But if it persists it can grow, slow and steady, until it breaks the fissure holding it in and ruptures the pavement.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> Actually I had most of the story written, but then Computer Trouble ate large parts of the middle which I hadn't yet backed up like all the other parts. I tried to get at rewriting the gaps, but so far it just never came out right again. And I felt really okay about the middle; it had Combeferre, and politics, and Feyjolras telling Combeferre, because he is Best, more faedrama and 1830. Alas.


End file.
